Pizza Express in South Oxfordshire

Lovely place for a family dinner, great service

I love this place, I hate the fact that people treat restaurant like this as a sandwich place where they can get their food in 5 min, must change your mentality otherwise use Waitrose or get your pack lunch and sit on the main site, always happy to be here, very friendly people and delicious food, will always come back.

Very delicious food and the team is very friendly

Nice and very clean looking restaurant, I love my pollo pesto

So I’m going in with a 4 here as I couldn’t see the value in a Pizza Express at the Oxford Services but now I have small kids… it really was a life saver to break up a long journey and get them lunch. Now service wise these guys need a little support, we asked to try some wine and essentially we were given 3 small glasses of wine..not a problem for us but a taster was only required however food was decent and overall we’d appreciate the teams efforts.

Amazing pizza, exceptional service, one unforgettable experience, well done to the team and the main manager, It's not just a pizza place, it's a moment of pure joy.

The waiter was extremely rude, didn't do my order properly nor did he speak to me in a nice way. When I came back because a part of my order was missing, instead of solving the problem the waiter blamed me for not speaking loud enough when I repeated the order 3times. And he told me to MOVE away from him he needs space, which he already has the space he needed, I found that extremely disrespectful. Then when I moved away from him, he said he couldn't hear me and wants me to speak louder.The attitude of his was ridiculous. Would probably never come back here again.

I recently visited and was pleasantly surprised by the exceptional service from one of the staff members, an asian gentleman glasses. His attention to detail and friendly demeanor made the experience truly enjoyable. The pizza was delicious, Overall the visit exceeded my expectations, thanks in large part to his outstanding hospitality.

Nicely done. Engaging staff It is just so good to have a full service restaurant on a motorway service station Well done Isabella and your colleague FOH Nice work in the Kitchen too

Worst customer service ever experienced in my life.

Terrible service. Not enough staff. Took 2 hours to have a meal. Pasta was poor - kid’s bolognese was badly cooked and there was no meat in the sauce; cannelloni was very sloppy.

Terrible, stay away! The most disgusting pizzas I have ever been served. The dough was leathery and tasteless, the same goes for the meager amount of ingredients. You are paying over £15 for a child's-sized pizza. Personnel here couldn't crack a smile to save their own lives & the server just put the to be paid amount on the machine and then walked away from us. Even for a roadside restaurant, this is abysmal. The nearby burger King holds itself to higher culinary standards than this place!

One of the worst pizza of my life. I had a Margherita. I am italian, and I've had thousands in my life. Well, this one was by far the worst: not only the tomato sauce and mozzarella were tasteless, the dough was undercooked, but also it was SMALL. Literally a child pizza. My boyfriend had it worse, and got a calzone with some weird salty besciamella like sauce in it. The staff was also not great: not kind, not caring, no questions, totally disinterested. On top of that, it was seriously too expensive, even for british standards. Ragazzi, state alla larga da questo posto

Avoid spending your hard earned cash at this place. We were met by a male on Saturday evening and shown to a table without even a smile or eye contact. He flung the menus and the allergen menu down on the table and walked away. So we did too! We walked straight out - and this isn't the first time either. It happened last year, we hoped it would have improved but sadly it hasn't. Wake up Pizza Express and do something.

Very good food at reasonable prices.

Not a good experience. Just had a meal here and the service was POOR. The servers were not friendly, or helpful, and appeared disinterested. The man that met us at the door and seated us, did not say hello, or smile. The servers need hospitality training. The food was okay. When spending money on eating out, it is very disappointing to have such poor service. Also, just read on a response from another review that extra parking time can be provided by Pizza Express, we mentioned our concern around parking to our server but she did not mention this - again disappointing, as we had to leave in a hurry due to the parking limitations.

Not sure what the point of this restaurant is when they can’t get the order right, the service is abysmal, and the staff are absolutely miserable. Staff seem annoyed that you walk into the restaurant even when they have tables available, they seem annoyed when you order - no smiles, no politeness, no hospitality or customer service. They are utterly disinterested in allergies or intolerances despite going through the motions of asking the question and handing over an allergen menu, as shown by still serving the dish with the allergen. Waited a long time for them to remake the dish. They did not cut the pizza for a child as requested. Had to wait and ask for basic condiments and black pepper. Everything took a long time and staff are actively ignoring customers. Overall, what a miserable restaurant that we paid £80 for. No service charge was ever deserved for this experience.

Over half an hour before anyone would come to us (and only when we went to get someone) Two starters of three were forgotten. One main forgotten. Not sure why we ordered as they didn't know what we'd ordered anyway.

Don't bother eating here. Go somewhere else. Got served by this guy who looked like he wants to quit his job. The pasta in the carbonara was burnt and lacking taste very bland and the pizza was so oily it made us sick afterwards.

I didn't get service; I got served. It might be that the owners see this as just a motorway services eatery, but I am a local resident - who could come back often. Service can always be worthwhile. Nothing really wrong, but not really right either.

Awful experience. Long wait for food, with no apology. Desultory, disinterested service. Dirty toilets. Really surprising from a Pizza Express.

Pleasant staff, but was extremely ill after eating the American hot Romano pizza. Now can’t do the marathon I am entered for today!!! Avoid unless you want to lose a lot of weight quickly.

I am writing to express my dissatisfaction with the management skills of Ms. Natalia, the assistant manager at the M40 branch. During my recent visit, I was disappointed by her rude behavior and lack of customer service skills. Her disrespectful conduct caused distress to my wife, and as a result, we have decided not to return to this branch until Ms. Natalia is replaced by a more competent manager. I hope that this matter will be addressed promptly to ensure a positive experience for all guests in the future. Thank you for your attention to this matter.

Had to wait a long time, but was rewarded with a top calzone.

For a motorway service station environment it's actually very good

This was a total waste of money and time. Waiting 40 minutes for tap water (after I have acknowledged the server again) and one hour for 2 poorly-made and small calzone (18 pounds each for some semi-cooked dough, bechamel sauce without any taste, 3 soured yellow cherry tomatoes and barely any chicken) and some "polenta chips" (£6 for 8 chips in total without much flavour on them). £42 wasted, down the drain as this restaurant does not know how to cook. After this, I went to chopstix to eat for half the price and I was very satisfied with the food. Do not try pizza express from this service (I have done already this mistake for you).

We had to wait for ages for my grandsons dessert about an hour. We kept asking. It wasn't even busy. Service poor. Prices expensive food not worth price.

Stopped here to break our journey. The food was good although I thought it was a little over priced. Although it is called express we spent nearly 2 hours here and barely avoided having to pay for exceeding the 2 hour parking limit. (In fairness we did have 8 in our party but the delay was more than what I thought was reasonable).

Management apparently don’t want HGV drivers in the restaurant. The food is obviously delivered by HGV drivers and the attitude of staff is now well known around the industry. I would probably give this place a wide berth.

Two stars for service only because a manager spoke with us even thou our English is not great. However a phrase "we don't want your kind in here" was used so that's truly great, keep up the great customer service!

I cannot tell you how bad our experience was at this restaurant. It was shocking. The staff are rude. Uninterested and unhelpful. The man who came to the door had no customer service skills, no smile. No greeting and was slamming chairs around. I asked for a gluten free menu and was instantly told there wasn’t one but didn’t tell me what I should do. Sat down and menus were almost thrown at us whilst the short somewhat rotund man slammed and banged around. Clearly not happy with life! I asked for glass of rose but got red. We were eventually served by “heather” who was scruffy and miserable. We asked for all starters and mains to come at the same time in which they didn’t. The food was subpar in comparison to other pizza expresses. My gluten free Fiorentina pizza was served to me with egg shell on top and when I told heather she apologised and stood by the table for 1 minute then left without saying a word. 10 minutes later our sides of polenta fries which were ordered at the same time as the rest, arrived barely cooked having been sat on the side for 10 minutes. We then took our sides home to properly cook with no mention of desserts our how our meal was. I have never been so appalled by a restaurant and can not believe how little training the staff have had in customer service skills. I’m a 100% certain everyone else felt the same.

Disastrous experience. Wrong order put through. Missing items from standard pizza. Slow service. No garlic butter on garlic bread. Took so long we got a fine for being over 2 hours in car park.

Underwhelming food at high prices served by staff (eventually) who seemed like they didn't want to be there.

I think it was under new management when I visited with the family. So lots of room for improvement. Lots of potential, just need to concentrate on some key aspects and then they will be flying. Good luck with the business.

Service was fast and polite. The food was what we expected but with it being a service station, atmosphere is not a concern.

Food very nice but the service is not quite my expectations, table not cleaned on time, no salt, pepper and cutlery on the table

It took less to get towed than getting a pizza here. Pizza was alright but expect about 17 pounds for a normal sized pizza

Rubbish experience. The restaurant was almost empty and staff walked past us multiple times. When we were finally seated, the staff, again, ignored us for a solid 20 minutes. No smiles, no pleasantries, barely any recognition. It took so long, we just left and grabbed a Burger King, whose staff actually gave us a much better experience. What a rubbish branch of an otherwise good chain.

Disappointing (Friday of a bank holiday weekend). It was busy but there weren’t enough staff or perhaps not enough staff with sufficient experience. Once the food arrived it was good and staff were very polite despite the pressure they were under.

a great and friendly place to eat. have to admit, i have little expectation from restaurants at services and assume it is focused on the quick passing trade. But the service, food and atmosphere at Pizza Express was great. Fantastic and attentive service from Claudiu Dumitrascu

Pizza was nice but the polenta chips was bland as anything. It took them to take me 12 mins to get me a bill !

Quick service, tasty gluten free mushroom pizza, lots of toppings, pleasant staff and decor looked good. Only negative was the £16.45 price tag

Very nice and helpful staff. The young lady who welcomed us outside was very helpful and pleasant.

Receptionist lies about offer they had. Very unacceptable from a big brand like this. Awful service

Quick service which is what we needed at a service station. Also got Blue Light discount 😊

My partner and I ordered a pizza and a classic lasagna and two drinks, the prices were a little exaggerated, a 330ml Coke €4.50, that is, a can, the lasagna that cost us about €20 is the same as the supermarket one and The pizza was delicious but just as thin as a taco cake, in conclusion we got all this for €50 and we were left hungry.

Excellent staff, very attentive. Good food. So glad we were able to stop

Friendly atmosphere and service from Claudiu Dumitrascu. Food was great but expensive for lunch

Food is fine. Hygiene is substandard. Dirty glasses and cutlery. Staff is not professional nor friendly. We won't come here anymore.

They were really busy which is nice to see, but not enough staff!! There were two servers, then one ended up in the kitchen!! Leaving one poor girl run off her feet and dealing with disgruntled clientèle on her own. Tables with young families who can be entertained for only so long we're waiting ridiculous amounts of time for their orders. I was on my own. Ordered a Lasagne which took over half an hour to come and was not great! The toilets were grubby with no toilet paper. I am often at this welcome break, but doubt I shall be visiting this Pizza Express again

Filthy restaurant. Pizzas soggy and not up to the usual standard

When there recently and honestly I can say it’s a 10/10 experience. The service was wonderful, the server was enthusiastic and welcoming. Excellent tasting food with very quick service. Would definitely recommend to anyone who has a weakness for some good Italia cuisine.

Lovely place with great atmosphere. Our server Natalie was very pleasant and advised what we can have from the menu. Food was delicious.

I ordered the pizza with extra chicken but ultimately I didn't get it. My partner had the calzone with wilted salad. At the end of service the room was almost empty but the waitress was not at all responsive. Once pizza was finished we waited at least 30 minutes for the desert menu.

We shan't be going back. We ordered our food, didn't get asked about dough sticks with our salad. We couldn't get onto one of our Pizza Express apps, my dough balls arrived, barely warm, I am used to them nearly burning my fingers. My husband didn't have cutlery, he got them off another table. When our main course arrived, we still had our starter plates and again my husband didn't have cutlery and got some from another table himself. On my pizza I had green olives on it and they're usually black. Overall it just felt much unlike most Pizza Express restaurants we've been to. Service was the absolute minimum

Big Pizza Express fan but everything about this place disappointed. Food was poor. Service was slow and staff couldn’t care less. Give this place a miss.

Very nice service from Natalia & the food was really good if a little slow in arriving. Excellent service from the manager, Bosnik. I left my handbag there & he kept it safe until I could collect it the next day. He was genuinely welcoming & we would certainly go there again if in the area.

Was more expensive that the restaurants on the high street

the staff were terrible wanted us out before we got in . 45 minutes wait for food, he said , but we were hungry, so we went in. Took orders, including drinks. Okay, we knew we would wait for food but drinks as well? After

Really enjoy coming here. Nice ambience. Attentive team. Great, fresh food. Zoltan was really amazing with our little boy. Will come back.

Lovely vibes and delicious food!! Came here while travelling and got seated right away and attended to right away!

Amazing food as always and great service from the team. Very attentive and would definitely come back again. Keep it up!

Fantastic food and wine as well as very attentive service. What more could you need?

Experience was a a lot better than I previous trips here.

It was OK, food came quickly but the mains arrived before we had even finished the starters. Pizzas were nice and the kids menu was enjoyed by both my children

I had to wait ages for my pizza even though it wasn’t very busy. I saw my pizza sat in the side for quite a few minutes until it was brought to me so of course then it was not hot. The pizza wasn’t how it had been described- I have had this pizza many times and always enjoyed it - I did not enjoy this one. Even when the waiter asked how it was and I told him it wasn’t as I expected nothing was done. The waiter serving me was rude and bad tempered! I will not go there again. It really was not like the pizza express I am used to - and I have been to many

The best Pizza Express restaurants have character. The one on the Basingstoke ring road shows it doesn't come from a glamorous location (seriously, it's worth a visit!) Sadly this one was not in that league when we visited. Service was fast once we ordered but slow to get to order and performed without any warmth. Food was brand standard, which means good!

Stopped in for lunch, our server Claudio was a delight so helpful

Worst experience of a pizza express. There were 3 tables when we got in and it still took us 5 minutes to get seated. All the food was wrong or undercooked. They didn’t tell us which menu items were unavailable until we already ordered them. Pizza was severely undercooked, the dough was basically still raw. Halloumi bites were freezing on the inside, and then when we complained he just stuck his finger in them right in front of us. We also ordered a brownie, to which we had cinnamon put on which isn’t even part of the presentation. Won’t be back

We were wary going here after reading the reviews, but location-wise it was exactly what we needed so we decided to risk it. So glad we did - service was quick, food was delicious and overall we had a lovely family lunch altogether. They have a full vegan menu too! I've knocked it down from 5 to 4 stars purely because the coffee machine was out of order so we had to go across to Starbucks for a coffee afterwards. But otherwise no complaints and we would happily return.

Terrible service very slow considering it was empty, food was poorly cooked and presented with many ingredients missing

Convinced me that I never want to go to a pizza express again. Poor food, overpriced, but all the flies and midges you ever didn't want

Excellent service, as Indians we came for lunch on diwali and were served by a lovely Indian lady (assuming) who was polite and apologetic for the food delays even though my companions were slightly rude about the long wait for food. Working on Diwali as an Indian and maintaining great service despite unkindness is admirable, I commend pizzaexpress Oxford on this choice of staff.

Best pizzis in the UK. wish they would come to Germany.

Food was great! Service was great but at lot of flies about the place while we were eating which put us off slightly.

I feels very bad customer service at this restaurant. It’s takes ages to take order and when we ask about the bill they don’t even give any response for a while as the restaurant was not too busy at that moment. K feel it as a really bad experience.

There was a long wait to get seats and the waiter spilled sauce on my colleague. The pizza itself was good however.

Arrived and stood unacknowledged for 10 minutes (whilst the waitress stood next to us on her phone). A random man (who turned out to be another waiter/manager?) physically pushed my bf out of the way to put menus on the desk at which point we asked whether there was a table. He said no then walked off. On his return circuit around the room, we then asked him how long it’d be - he shrugged and said maybe 15-30 minutes. 5 minutes later he pointed at a table and told us to sit there. The table was covered in half drunk drinks and used napkins - at this point we left and went and got KFC. Genuinely never experienced anything like it in my life. Avoid like the plague.

The food we had was fine. Sadly our first choices were not available, it would have been better to have been told that before we were seated.

Great spot to stop for a quick lunch

When we got there we were greeted by a friendly waitress who sat us down immediately. Our experience with our waiter was vastly different from the positive welcome re recieved. He failed to inform us at the beginning of the meal that certain items on the menu were unavailable which was unfortunate as those items were the ones we tried to order. The food we eventually got was bland and difficult to eat. The toilets were absolutely disgusting and difficult to use due to how grim they were.

Please avoid this place if you want food in under an hour and a half. I didn't read reviews before we went last week. We arrived at 6.45pm. By 19.50 we still hadn't had our food. We got up to leave, within a few minutes they threw a pizza and things on a plate and told us it was our order. More bothered about fulfilling takeaway orders than people who go into eat. Worst £32 I've ever spent. I should of got a refund and need to write to pizza express as they advertise outside the restaurant pizza within 9 minutes or something..... More like 109 minutes if your lucky. Shocking, not even an apology or money off etc. Should of refused to pay!

I can not describe what a poorly run place Pizza Express is. We could not order the pizza we like as they didn't have the ingredients, the same with our second choice. We politely asked if they could melt the butter for the dough balls to help apply to them, unfortunately this was a task too hard for the kitchen. When the pizza came out (minus the extra topping we asked for) we had to ask for a pizza cutter to cut the pizza into slices ourselves, It was a shambles. We complained and were given a 20% discount but left half of the dough balls and two thirds of the pizza. Thankfully Burger King was next door. The only highlight was watching other customers who were too polite to ask for a pizza cutter, rip their pizza to bits and eat like savages. How this place is still operating is mind boggling

The worst customer service ever, the guy who was serving us, was so rude, no smile on his face very abrupt. The pizzas were so dry, and the base was like burnt toast. Glasses were dirty, were not given any plates, had to get up and ask for it from the kitchen. Will not ever go there again!

Took an hour to get food and half the food seemed unavailable. Our main server seemed completely oblivious the whole situation was rescued by Erica who came across apologized and told us they didn't have mushrooms and jumped in when our main server ignored us. Give Erica a raise and workout what the heck is going on with everyone and everything else, possibly the worst pizza express experience

They were unable to apply the student discount on their system and proceeded to tell us that it was our fault because of what we ordered and conflicting with the promo (it wasn’t). Very rude and gas lighting when trying to solve. We were being very pleasant but the manager gas lit us into making us think it was our issue, saying we shouldn’t have ordered certain food, or that it wasn’t valid on a Tuesday (despite the offer being valued Sunday-Thursday). Wish they were just honest they didn’t know how to make the system work, rather then being rude to us. Food was awful for a £16 pizza, management were incompetent and rude. Waiter was lovely and more helpful than the manager — and actually understood the situation as the manager made a scene in the restaurant.

Since the staff have changed so much its gone down hill, the service the attitude of waiters, probably the worst time I've ever been, not overly busy, tables not cleared, service well ask 3 times to actually get a drink then they arrive with out glasses, and God arrived and no cutlery..

What a great place to stop off at and so clean and tidy. Friendly atmosphere from all staff. The best services we have been to.

Service a bit slow ( it wasn't busy) but the food was what you would expect for pizza express and the restaurant was clean

Came in, sat down for a table with the family. Three waiters and after 10mins still no service of any kind. We walked out. Waiters were simply not even bothered. Two other tables followed suit. Wouldn’t be so bad if they were busy. A total of six tables in the entire restaurant. Terrible!

Were served what we ordered and in good time

Visited this evening (17th Aug). Restaurant was very quiet compared to other eateries on site. No more than 5 tables occupied with 5-6 crew members on duty. Store team were preoccupied with each other and seemed largely cheesed off that customers were in the restaurant. A member of the team grumbled about the state in which a neighbouring table had been left by a family with toddlers and then seemingly left it for a more junior member of the team to clean up. I can't imagine the junior team member will be in role long, it seemed like too much trouble for others to engage with her. No visit to the table to check diners satisfaction of order and in my case I wasn't half way through my starter when I was presented with my main course. I mentioned this to the server that put my main on the table but there was no offer to take it back to the kitchen. I was in and out within 20 minutes, 2 courses and a glass of wine. Not something to be proud of. Lack of leadership resulted in a really poor guest experience.

I am totally shocked and disgusted at the poor service at the Oxford services branch . As we sat down a family of six got up and left as they had been sitting for half an hour and still hadn’t had their food order taken . We had to wait about ten minutes for ours to be taken but that was after one of the waiters had finished his conversation with his friend from Starbucks ! When ordering we asked for our salad to come the same time as our mains , this didn’t happen , the salad came almost straight away and then we had to call over to the waiter to ask for our drinks after another ten minutes . During the time spent in the restaurant , the two waiting staff were in deep conversation with each other , complete oblivious to their customers waiting and to the calls from the chefs shouting “service” . At one point they were both stood in the back room chatting while the chefs had to serve the pizzas , we even seen one of the chefs go into the back room to bring them out to serve their customers !! I have honestly never seen anything like this in my life , I don’t know how anyone can think this is acceptable behaviour . To be fair to the chefs , they were holding the place together , cooking , serving and chasing up the shocking awful waiters to get out and do their job. Never again !!!

On arrival you wait to be seated. 11 tables free out of approximately 25. Nobody acknowledges us for 10 minutes, nobody in front of us, nobody behind and is not particularly busy. We are seated with one menu between 3, not a massive problem but old food on the “clean” cutlery was. Only one fork out of 3 was dirty to be fair. The guy laying the table was pleasant enough and said they were very busy. (The restaurant was just over half full.) Then 20 mins passes. No drinks offered. No food order taken. We seemed like an inconvenience. There was a female waitress in a red top who unfortunately was very rude and we had enough. We left without putting an order in.

Very fast and friendly service. Takeaway pizzas and doughballs ready in under 10 minutes. Highly recommend as a takeaway option when stopping for a break. Very clean inside and looks lovely for dine in too.

Regularly not open when it should be 11:30am to 12:30pm. Staff inside but door locked and no effort made to acknowledge or open. Seems a bit understaffed even when open. Food delicious of course to normal excellent Pizza Express standards, if you can get it!

Good food for a stop off...perfect for gulton free diets

Usually enjoy the pizza express experience but this is by far the worst restaurant I have visited. The service was shocking! The restaurant was quiet but there were 4/5 staff stood around chatting and on their phones and the only person who seemed to be doing anything was a young girl who advised it was her first day. She was actually the only helpful and polite member of staff there. When asking why it was taking over an hour to get our food the waitress who we finally managed to speak to said ‘why, are you in a rush?’. I mean we didn’t come to the services for a leisurely evening out!! To top it all the food wasn’t up to usual pizza express standard. It seemed we weren’t the only people experiencing issues there last night going by the complaints from the other tables!! Clearly very badly managed

This restaurant was not being properly managed and standards were not being upheld. The issues we had were: 1. Waiting 10 minutes with a baby without being greeted or acknowledged. 2. Being promised a high chair which was not brought. 3. Taking a long time to take our order. 4. Bottles drinks left unopened on the table. 5. One main forgotten but the kitchen and hastily made, still arriving late. 6. Half the pizza base tasting of cleaning fluid. 7. Toilets not stocked with toilet paper. This needs some intervention as it’s not acceptable at the moment.

On my way home and decided to call in for something to eat. Food was extremely good but a little disappointed with the staff as we were told there would be a 40 minute wait for food - the restaurant was no where near full and it felt like we weren't wanted???? Better customer service definitely needed.